


when i see you, flowers bloom

by LunarExo



Category: Dragon Quest XI
Genre: Alternate Universe – Bloominary, First Kiss, Fluff, Flutie Tag: WHY AM I SO EMOTIONAL ABOUT SOUP BOWLS NOW, Hero | Luminary is Named Eleven | El (Dragon Quest XI), M/M, Stargazing, environmental awareness, flowers instead of lightning yknow how it is, inappropriate use of heroic reputation to make up new constellations for the fuck of it, invasive plant species being semi-appropriately handled, no major spoilers for act 2 or 3, unspecified time period, verbal luminary
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-14
Updated: 2020-02-14
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:28:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22681003
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LunarExo/pseuds/LunarExo
Summary: "The plants that sprung up with his every step were a new addition to his life, as new as the mark on his hand glowing an ethereal green, as new as the journey he set out on, and as new as the shape of Erik’s silhouette, two steps ahead of him, guiding him quietly across the still sun-warmed sands."Even if Eleven never verbalized his feelings, some things were just as telling.
Relationships: Camus | Erik/Hero | Luminary (Dragon Quest XI)
Comments: 24
Kudos: 82





	when i see you, flowers bloom

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Couvina](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Couvina/gifts).



> HAPPY VALENSLIMES 2020 LETS GET THIS BREAD (the bread is fics)

[It was just the two of them around the campfire now.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EF8tyJA1VPE)

Not that it was much of a fire anymore, this late in the night. Low and smouldering, it was naught more than burning embers, their centres orange hot and their edges as deep black as the desert sky above. It had crackled before, as lively as their party, and now it felt subdued with each member dutifully off to bed.

Each, that is, except for himself and Erik.

As if he knew Eleven’s exact thoughts, Erik leaned over and bumped their shoulders together.

“Hey,” he murmured, a suggestion audible in the lilt of his voice. When Eleven turned to him, he caught sight of the curl of his lips, drawn up into something playful and secret and just between them.

He leaned back on the wood log, meeting Erik’s eyes. A matching smile tugged at his own face, and Erik gestured away from the campfire, into the cool desert beyond.

“Wanna see something cool?”

  


Eleven had been an adventurous child, the type to go barrelling eagerly into any new situation with both his sword and head held proud. But he’d been tempered as well, his urges held back by promises and assurances, by the memory of Gemma’s eyes shining wide and wet with tears and the burn of the ground on his skin, hard and rough.

“ _Idiot_ ,” she cried, her voice shaking on every syllable, her little hands clenched into trembling fists. “I told you you’d get hurt!”

She had, and he had, and now he sat atop the kitchen counter, Amber alternating with expert precision between gently dabbing his cut arm with stinging alcohol and comforting Gemma’s heartbroken sniffles with shushing and quiet, comforting words.

It was only after Amber had walked her home and returned that Eleven had met his mother’s eyes, one hand clutched around his now bandaged injury.

“I won’t do it again,” he promised, forcing his chest to puff out with potent, childlike pride.

She didn’t look surprised in the least, and the look in her eyes was soft with knowing. (He was a predictable child as well, grown into a predictable young man.) Then, she brushed the hair from his forehead to lay a soft kiss there, her words warm against his skin. “I’m sure you won’t.”

  


Loyalty may have tempered him, but he was still adventurous at heart, and Erik seemed to have a way of bringing that part of him out of hiding, a few coy looks and teasing words enough to coax the embers of his curiosity to flare once more, to drag a blooming, burning need to see and know and _live_ from him. He was to his feet fast—fast enough that Erik laughed, his lips curled into a lopsided grin that made El’s bright heart go _thump thump_ heavy in his chest.

“Guess that’s a yes,” Erik said, and his eyes caught on the moonlight, reflecting that brightness right back to El.

  


The plants that sprung up with his every step were a new addition to his life, as new as the mark on his hand glowing an ethereal green, as new as the journey he set out on, and as new as the shape of Erik’s silhouette, two steps ahead of him, guiding him quietly across the still sun-warmed sands.

They changed with the climate, largely. In Cobblestone, he remembered stiff grass and tiny daisies sprouting where he walked, his sword and head held proud as he marched off to his destiny (or, at least, to his horse.) In the Manglegrove his steps had produced lush greenery, sprouting ferns and colourful orchids that Erik had marvelled at until Eleven was flushed as bright as their silky petals.

“ _And you’re supposed to be the_ Darkspawn?” He’d crowed, pointing wildly at the blooms. “ _Think you can grow some fruit?_ ” (He could not, sadly, grow fruit. But he could be convinced to hold Erik’s hand, and be guided in a senseless, winding loop while his companion grinned wider and wider. It was only when El stepped back that he realised he’d been tricked into growing a shape rather…phallic into the mud. Erik’s laughter rung out as he stomped away, petulant and embarrassed and trying not to laugh himself.)

In the deserts around Gallopolis it was spiky, hardy bushes and round cacti, small and bumpy. Eleven didn’t claim to know a lot about plant life, but he knew this much was right: grass for the valleys, moss for the tropics, and cacti for the desert. The specifics may have been lost on him, but even a child could recognize that different places had different plants, and so his magic—tied to a very large and very powerful plant as it was—would surely be the same, right?

It would, after all, be less than great if he went around leaving asters and lilies wherever he stepped, regardless of clime or weather.

  


Erik turned to face him, the moon catching on his wide, toothy grin. El hadn’t noticed him stop— _didn’t_ notice until he’d barrelled right into him, forcing that pretty smile to collide with his chest.

He flushed and sputtered and grew warm, too stunned to pull away from their sudden and embarrassing closeness. It was Erik who managed to put that distance between them, extracting himself with the faintest dusting of pink across his own cheeks.

 _Embarrassing_ , El thought, quietly hoping he didn’t smell too much like the desert trudging fugitive he was, and much more loudly thinking about how warm Erik had been, chasing off the oppressive desert chill with the press of his body, surprisingly solid as he was.

Even when he’d pulled away, Erik kept a loose hold on both of Eleven’s forearms, guiding him along with his touch. The sight of his hands on El’s skin was magnetizing, the same smart hands he’d seen snatching and swiping and swindling so gentle where they curled around his skin.

He did not look back, did not look anywhere as he was walked across the sand. Where his feet had been, a perfect circle of perfect circles sprouted up, round and pink and blooming.

  


“It’s not much,” Erik confessed. His feet stopped, the heels of his shoes digging into the soft sand. Eleven noticed then, that his footsteps had been so light he’d barely left a trace, whispers on the surface of the desert. Beside his own heavy footfalls, and that constant, incessant trail of flora that sprouted from them, Erik’s were almost non-existent.

He tore his eyes away from the odd scene to look at Erik instead, and at the…completely normal surroundings. There was a neat cliff face, he guessed, but he’d also grown up beside a pretty neat cliff face, and he was pretty sure Erik knew that by now, the way he seemed to know everything about Eleven (because he kept telling him, but he didn’t need to remind himself that right now, when they were somewhere private where he just might tell him even more.)

Curious, and maybe just a little suspicious, El raised a pointed eyebrow, and Erik’s hand raised to rub nervously at the back of his neck almost instantly in response. “Yeah, I know, I know, I said something _cool_. Benefit of the doubt, alright?”

His hand moved from the back of his neck to the side of it, and Eleven saw him grab at the collar of his cape and pull it up over his head and off entirely. He shivered empathetically, eyeing his bare shoulders and exposed midriff, but Erik seemed unphased. He simply took the fabric and laid it out on the sand, before flopping unceremoniously down. When Eleven didn’t move, he shifted to the side, patting the spot beside him incessantly.

“Don’t want sand in our hair,” he explained. Eleven exhaled, understanding carrying him forwards. He sat down beside Erik, eyeing the cape. It was…small. Of course it was. Erik was short, and it really only went down past his knees.

(El would know—he’d been the one who’d made it, who’d measured Erik so carefully despite their mutual sputtering, looping a tape measure around his arms and legs and slender waist, who’d spent hours banging away at his forge. Seeing Erik get so much use out of it made a pleasant warmth bloom in his chest, proud and fond. A different warmth than the one he felt now, realising just how close he’d be to his companion, if he laid down on that scant piece of fabric.)

Erik smirked at him. But it was patient, somehow, and he raised one of his arms, beckoning Eleven closer to him. “Come on. Nobody else can see.”

El frowned. It wasn’t anybody else he was worried about. But his traitorous heart sputtered in his chest, and he found himself moving of his own accord, pressing in close to Erik to lie on his back.

And close he was, close enough that El could feel the heat radiating off his skin, close enough that if he were to reach over but one hands width his palm would meet warm skin and solid muscle and a thumping, beating heart to match his own. He swallowed hard.

“Was that so hard?” He heard Erik ask.

He shook his head no, _as easy as breathing_ , and felt Erik’s relieved laughter where his head laid on his arm. His fingers pet at the back of El’s head, stroking at the shorter, softer hairs there, and El melted against him, his toes curling in his boots. Was he even aware of what his hands were doing? Did he know what an impact it was having on Eleven?

Goddess above, he hoped not. He couldn’t think of anything more embarrassing than Erik knowing just how flustered he was and using that knowledge to mess with him.

He wouldn’t, right? He was sneaky, and sometimes a bit silly, but not mean. Not to El. Not to anyone really, not if they couldn’t fight back. And El’s heart felt so worn and weary with the force of his emotions, he knew he’d be entirely unable to do anything but keel over if that were the case.

As it was, he very nearly felt like doing exactly that, regardless of Erik’s knowledge or intent. Erik had pressed _closer_ , somehow, and the side of his face was warm where he’d pressed himself flush to El’s head, nose just short of being buried in his hair. He felt the side of every inhalation tickle his scalp, and Erik’s heartbeat in the whole of his arm. Goddess above, he wanted, and wanted, and wanted.

The flowers burst from the sand beneath his arms, rooting impossibly in the dry, thin ground. Their petals strained to Erik like he was their sun, the brightest warmest light of them all.

El did not notice them—he didn’t notice anything but Erik’s fingers stretching to brush his cheek and guide his face skyward. His fingers were warm, so warm, and even though his own skin felt feverish they still left a pleasant burn in their wake. Erik’s voice was barely a whisper as he breathed against his ears. “Can’t see stars like this in the city, you know.”

(He had never lived in the city in his life—he knew very well. He nodded anyway, Erik’s fingers tickling his face as he did. They’d lingered close to him, and he didn’t know what that meant—he didn’t know what any of this meant, except that his heart was crying out, and his whole body felt on air.)

“The stars tell stories,” Erik added, so absentmindedly El might have thought he wasn’t paying attention to him at all—if not for the ever-present touch of his hands, and the burning warmth of his focus. He felt both like a brand, and oriented towards his warmth with the same ferocity as his telling plants.

“When I was a kid,” he continued, “the vi—uh, my caretakers, they told stories about them, sometimes. About the mage, and the Sabrecat family, and Yggdrasil’s chosen,” his fingers dragged their way across the sky as he spoke, and El followed with his gaze. He flushed at the last one, and at Erik turning to him, teeth exposed in a cheeky grin. “Sailors use it to orient, you know. The tales say, if you follow her brightest light, you’ll always find your way home.”

Eleven swallowed hard. “Do you believe it?” His squeaked out, voice high and nervous. Even when he cleared his throat, the feeling remained, an awful tension that rose up his neck and locked up his jaw.

Erik frowned, and one of his shoulders raised in a shrug. “I used to,” he said, “I mean, it _works_. Can’t deny the facts there. But there’s something a little closer than the stars I’d rather follow.” His cheeks were pink; El’s lit up to match, warm enough to make the cold night air nip sharply at them. 

The words flustered him, but he still found himself leaning closer, guilt heavy on his conscience. “What if it leads you the wrong way?”

Erik snorted in response, and if he curled closer as well, neither one of them mentioned it. “I have faith. Besides, that means I had a right way to go in the first place. Come on, do you really think a common thief had some grand plan for life?”

El’s brow furrowed. “Yes?” It only scrunched up more when Erik’s thumb brushed over the tense line of his forehead, trying to smooth it away. “You had the red orb,” he insisted. Erik’s hand paused, but he carried on, “if you’d wanted it just to sell it for the cash, then it wouldn’t have been a problem when Derk sold it, right? But we went and got it again, and you were just—just carrying it around. You needed it for something, right?”

Erik sighed, his fingers moving, brushing the hair from Eleven’s face. “I needed it to meet you. That’s all the Seer said. It was just… Look, you don’t need to worry about it.”

His eyes said, _please, don’t ask about it¸_ and as strongly as the question rose up to the tip of his tongue, Eleven swallowed it down. He turned to the sky instead, fingers tracing along a cluster of stars. “What about this one?”

“That one?” Erik asked, pressing in closer and grabbing his hand. Warmth rolled off him in waves, and El sank into it, trying not to be too obvious about the way he melted against him.

Erik traced the shape of the star, pulling Eleven along with him. He almost wanted to laugh—how many times had Erik pulled him along somewhere now, and he’d gone willingly, blinded by his own puppy love. He may have thought he was following the Luminary, but El knew he was just as often the one trailing eagerly after him.

“That,” Erik murmured, his voice pitched low. El hadn’t noticed how close he was, breath brushing the hair at the back of his neck, blistering hot, “is the River of Life. See how it curves?” His hand moved again, El’s dragged thoughtlessly with it, “the stories say that all the other constellations come to drink from it only once a year, and that’s why the stars change positions through the seasons.”

“Is that a real thing?”

Erik laughed, a low rumble that reverberated through him and to El. “They’re all stories. But so was all that stuff about the Luminary. Why, you want to make your own?”

“Own story?”

“Own constellation,” Erik corrected. His thumb stroked at the inside of Eleven’s wrist, coaxing his hand open so he could entwine their fingers together, “we can tell people we meet about it, make it a whole thing. They’ll write about it in books.”

Eleven nodded, squeezing Erik’s hand in his own. “Okay, we can do this.” He scanned the sky, pulling their joined arms with his gaze, tracing the stars as they went. Erik pressed against him, his smile pressed against Eleven’s shoulder.

His movement stopped towards the corner of the sky, pointed at a small series of stars that curved into a loose half circle. When he was done tracing it, he turned to Erik. “It’s a bowl. For soup, like the kind you made for dinner.”

“A soup bowl,” Erik repeated. El hummed affirmatively. “The Luminary’s soup bowl.”

“It’s good,” El insisted, pulling his hand down. Erik’s went with him. Their hands stayed joined, even without the pretense of tracing the stars.

“It is,” Erik agreed. His smile grew soft. “Can’t let anyone forget our legendary hero can eat a whole pot of stew all on his own. Now it’s _my turn_.”

  


For all he insisted he couldn’t spin a tale to save his life, Erik had Eleven enraptured with his words. He found himself not even looking at the stars, as beautiful as they were. But it was hard to feel the loss, when looking at Erik felt like seeing something just as grand and beautiful, the sky painting him his own hues of black and navy and blue.

And it was just for him, for _them_. These stories he told with the stars weren’t for the world, not like his own had been. They were private, and hushed, and felt more like Erik baring his soul for El to see than they had any right to. His heart hammered at his chest again, threatening to break free any moment.

It was only Erik’s shy smile, disarming as it was, that kept it locked firmly where it belonged.

Erik’s arms raised suddenly, drawn above his head as he groaned and stretched. Without the support under his neck, El slumped down to the sand, his eyes wide and unseeing, the breath knocked right from him. Where Erik feigned casual ease, El’s heart had near stopped with shock, and his whole body thrummed with emotion.

“Should get back to the camp,” Erik said. In any other situation, it’d have sounded like a normal, thoughtless suggestion. But El could hear the embarrassment underlaying his voice, and when Erik extended a hand to help him up he felt his heartbeat thrumming heavy through his palm.

When Erik pulled him up, El all but stumbled into his arms. It was hard not to—his legs felt wobbly, and he felt lightheaded, the butterflies in his stomach trying their darndest to draw him up into the sky. He giggled, the sound nervous and fluttery. Erik laughed right back, his hands gentle where they held onto Eleven’s arms and righted him.

He was still smiling, a faint quirk of his lips that only barely matched the discerning look in his eyes. It felt protective, and if Eleven wasn’t already several shades too hot under the ferocity of his attention, he’d have grown hot all over again at the careful way Erik looked him over.

Then his eyes slid off of El’s form, to the space around them, and that look grew wide-eyed. El’s eyes followed, his neck craning, body turning in Erik’s loose grip.

And there, in a vaguely human form, was a blooming field of flowers, of pinks and whites and yellows all straining to _Erik_ in lieu of the missing sun, their leaves bright and green and vibrant. Erik made a soft sound beside him, something like surprise and awe, and El gasped, clamping a hand over his mouth to muffle the noise.

This was…

 _Oh no_.

He flinched at Erik’s hand grabbing at his arm, concern drawing tension to his handsome features. El wanted to smooth it away. El wanted to kiss him still. He also wanted very, very badly to melt entirely into the ground, to let it consume him and grow even more of these damning, telling flowers.

Erik leaned down, his fingers brushing against the soft purple of a bunch of lilacs, grown as impossibly from the ground as every other piece of flora. El followed after him—although much less smoothly—his hand curling around the stem of another flower, a yellow-white daffodil that looked almost like the stars they’d been gazing at.

Erik didn’t look away from the lilac. His voice was soft. “You grew—”

“We need to pick them,” Eleven replied, cutting him off.

“What—” Erik said. Then, with a knowing furrow of his brows, he started to pull them up as well.

  


It took them a frustrating amount of time to pull them all up, and through the whole while El felt fit to combust, all too aware of just how much the blooms said when his words had not.

Arms overflowing with flowers, Erik smiled at him, the shape of it only barely visible behind the sheer volume of petals and leaves.

“These are really pretty.”

El turned away, his face warm. He heard Erik get closer, but didn’t turn back until a hand brushed his arm, soft and pleading. “Were these…‘cause of me?”

He said nothing. Erik exhaled, all the breath in his lungs leaving in one heavy sigh, the tail end of it catching on El’s cheek.

“El, can I…kiss you?”

His voice was barely a whisper, but Yggdrasil help him, he heard every last syllable loud and clear, even over the roaring desert winds.

Eleven’s hand cupped Erik’s neck. He could feel his pulse fluttering beneath his fingers, and it felt like his own matched. It drifted to his cheek, holding his face, and Erik’s eyes met his. They were big—big like he hadn’t expected El to agree, or to take the initiative.

Then he smiled, just the slightest upturn of his lips, and El felt the brush of dozens of flowers as Erik threw his arms over his shoulders and closed that scant, heated distance between them.

He was still so _warm_ , and El sighed out, his free hand settling on Erik’s waist to guide him closer. He kissed him again and again, chaste and short and painfully sweet, and each time Erik made the most pleased sounds against his lips, his fingers tangling into El’s hair with shameless enthusiasm.

Goddess above, he’d never thought kissing could be so _easy_ , but Erik made it feel like breathing. Or more, like the first breath after going without, the relief flooding his lungs and chest and all of him at once.

They pulled back soon enough. Erik was smiling at him—that same soft smile he’d had their first night together, and every other private moment since. Eleven realised then, that it was something he’d only ever seen directed at him, and he couldn’t stop the matching smile spread that spread across his face.

Erik’s smile grew smug. “That good, huh?”

El snorted, shoving a hand into Erik’s face. He sputtered in response, grabbing at El’s wrist to guide him into cupping his cheek instead. “I’ve wanted to do that for a long time,” Erik whispered, turning to kiss the inside of El’s wrist.

“Since—Since when?”

“Gondolia, at least.” He hesitated, teeth worrying at his pretty, kiss-swollen lips. “No, probably before that. Probably at Heliodor.”

“When you thought we’d die?”

“When I put the last of my faith in you.”

Eleven frowned, just a little. “I don’t know if I liked you then,” he admitted, feeling a little guilty.

Erik huffed, reaching out to brush his bangs from his face. “Make fun of me for falling for a pretty face more, why don’t you.”

The fondness in his eyes betrayed his lack of genuine hurt, but Eleven still reached for him, stepping further into his space, their chests flush once more. “I always thought you were pretty,” he insisted, and that had Erik laughing, face tucking into his neck like he’d never belonged anywhere else. “It’s just hard to think about, y’know… _romance_ , when you’re tossed into jail. I’d never even gotten grounded before, as a kid.”

“Grounded, huh?” Erik’s hands worked into his hair, scratching gently at his scalp, “that’s not a bad thing, you know. All this Luminary business, all that pressure, it’s hard, it’s _unfair_. But you know they’re okay, and they’re gonna keep being okay, and they’re always gonna love you. You deserve that love, Eleven.”

El pressed his face into Erik’s hair, smushing down his spikes with the weight of his face. He smelled like campfire and crisp air and sweat, and El really had no right to think _home_ as he breathed it in, like he could claim this kind, loyal thief as _his_ on the same level he did Cobblestone and Amber and Gemma and everyone else he’d already failed.

Then Erik squeezed him, sighing into his skin, and he found himself wondering if he’d found a home in El just the same, in the smell of burning metal and worn leather and the sharp scent of freshly cut flowers.

(The words, ‘they’ll love you too,’ shaped themselves on his tongue, and he mouthed them into the loaded silence between them, adding to its lofty weight. But he didn’t say it out loud—not yet.)

  


He lost track of how long they stood together. It could have been a minute, or as long as they’d laid on the sand, or for whole days at a time. He didn’t mind either way, and certainly didn’t want to be the one to pull away from the fragile, tender intimacy they’d forged.

He didn’t mean to voice that when Erik pulled away from him, but the despondent sigh escaped him all the same, long and heavy. Erik brushed his knuckles against his cheek in response, nodding empathetically.

“We have to go back before the others realise we’re gone,” Erik whispered, and then leaned in, pressing a quick, chaste kiss to El’s cheek, “c’mon, bloominary.”

Eleven’s nose scrunched up _immediately_. “That’s an awful name, don’t call me that. Most of the plants don’t bloom anyway.”

Erik stepped back. Then, raising an eyebrow, he crouched down and plucked a bunch of asters from the ground, their petals so purple they nearly glowed in the moonlight. “You were saying?”

“ _Most_ ,” he repeated, trying desperately to force down the blush rising on his cheeks. It didn’t work. Then he narrowed his eyes at the ground, and at the flowers incessantly sprouting up once more, “stop being cute, you’re making me grow weird things. These aren’t supposed to grow here.”

Erik had stayed crouched down, tugging at the new plants as they grew up. But that made him pause, turning to look at El. His eyes were wide, face soft with vulnerable awe. “It’s…it _is_ because of me?”

Eleven grimaced, and then glared, face scrunched up into an embarrassed frown. Erik couldn’t even muster up the energy to reminisce on how endearing it was, too busy watching him cycle through emotions before he finally let out a heavy sigh and a heavier shrug. “Probably. It isn’t like Yggdrasil told me personally that I’d grow flowers being around the person I like…”

“But,” Erik continued for him. El met his eyes, a hint of a smile quirking up his lips.

“But I get this feeling. They are mine, right? It’s normal.”

“It’s _not_ ,” Erik countered, even as he reached up and grabbed at El’s hand, pulling him down to crouch as well, “but it’s sweet.” He grinned, “Yggdrasil help me, I went and fell for the sweetest guy in the world.”

The flowers began to grow once more, and this time El kicked Erik rather than vocalize his frustration. Even as he clutched at his side in response, Erik grinned widely at him, picking the blooms before they could cause too much damage to the fragile desert ecosystem or El’s even more fragile, nervous heart.

  


While the desert nights were cool, the days were blistering hot, and under the open sky as they were it took only the faintest morning sunbeam to rouse the party from their slumber. Sylvando always woke up first, ever the morning rooster he was. Jade and Rab next, waking with a synchronized familiarity only years of travelling together could bring. Then Erik, and Serena and Veronica, and finally El—roused most often by breakfast cooking on a fire, or by one of his companions shaking him awake.

There was something different in that morning, though. For one, Erik was nowhere to be found—at least not at first glance.

And, more importantly, scattered haphazardly around the campsite, were enough flowers to fill the most ambitious florist’s shop. Lilacs and asters and daisies and camellias and even more that couldn’t be placed at first glance, all impossibly fresh despite having laid out for what must have been hours.

Sylvando saw it first, and by the time Serena had woken to gasp and coo over them (and Veronica had set about cursing how obvious a target they made them,) he’d managed enough chains of blooms to place one on the delicate crown of Serena’s head.

  


They found Erik soon enough, when Jade went to wake El. It’d be hard not to, when she nudged the sleeping bag off his shoulder and caught sight of bold blue hair, and noticed then that Eleven was holding something suspiciously companion shaped protectively to his chest.

And there, pillowing where they laid, was a batch of sleepy moss and clover, lush and green and utterly implausible. She glanced back at the rest of their companions—still enamoured with the strange and sudden floral gift they’d been given—and then back to Erik and Eleven, deeply and peacefully asleep.

She pulled the blanket back over them, and returned to the others.

(She missed the way Erik blinked blearily at her retreating figure, before he burrowed his face into the crook of El’s neck, chasing just a bit more of his comfort before the morning sun became too much to bear.)

**Author's Note:**

> Bloominary’s guide to expressing your emotions:  
> 
> 
> Pink Camellias: longing for the recipient  
>  Jonquils: desire for affection  
>  Lilac: first love  
>  Forget-Me-Nots: true love  
>  As well as anthurium, gardenia, daisy, and aster

> 
> The original bloominary pic this concept was based off of is [here](https://couvina.tumblr.com/post/188853155158/) which is also where the final four flowers came from—think of them like his signature blooms that pop up whenever he’s especially emotional. (Also, for people reading who don’t have the context, here are the flowers from the picture with the meanings intended by the artist. flower meanings aren’t universally consistent, but [these are the exact images he sent](https://i.imgur.com/ibFI7BX.png) regarding the picture and I referenced them often.)
> 
> anyway hi cou!!! i hope u like this fic because i made it specially for u!!! im sure u can recognize all the things u requested that i tried to incorporate. i hope u like the soup bowl too i was determined when i learned u were my valenslime to make sure there was fuckin… smth abt soup. if it wasn’t bloominary it was going to be smth going off your modern au where erik just gets the shit beaten out of him by el the fish shop boy and idk… he was gonna bring him soup or smth. it felt like an important thing to include. 
> 
> also thank you again to flutie for organizing this lovely event, and for letting me join last minute, and for being just all around wonderful and hardworking and sweet. points furiously at u. hey!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ur fantastic


End file.
